Breath
by LadyMoonHawke
Summary: Vignette -- In the final battle with Naraku, even the dead have a part to play. POV


Breath

_I am the wind… The free wind._

He thinks he has defeated me, a "reward" for my betrayal. My heart returned, left whole as he impaled me, my body filled with his filthy jyaki, then left to disintegrate. Sadistic bastard. Even now, he thinks I'm gone, left to die alone in fear and torment.

But I was not alone. _He_, the one who stayed, whose company I sought, he remained, watching, waiting, with no words of condescension or pity. He knew, I think, what I was saying, that I was willing to go, because he came to see me off. I heard his brother come as well, and the miko, the foolish girl who invited me to join them. What kind of heart is big enough to make that offer? Surely not mine, though mine is more than I could have hoped for.

I see _him_ now, sword forged from my brother's fangs held tight in one fist. How fortunate my erstwhile brother is, to be held like that. It was never my fate to be touched by that hand.

I can still touch, though. I brush across his face, ruffling silver-white bangs, caressing the blue-stained crescent, brushing through the fur of his mokomoko. How sensuous it would have been, wrapped around us as we pressed flesh to flesh. But I could never have been both free and his. His eyes widen the tiniest fraction, his breath catches, and his silent lips form my name. He knows, then, that I am here, to see this ending. Good. I would have him know, if no one else. I can hear the tightening of his grip, and his eyes narrow on his enemy. "Onore…" He is remembering our parting, the one responsible for it. He cannot forget, now or ever.

The brother is here, and the foreign miko with her strange clothing, a step to the side and behind, bow in hand. Of course. No final act would be complete without the all the players. The monk and female taijiya hold the demons of the air at bay; the male taijiya, Kohaku, is gone, and I know he has found his peace.

The other miko, the undead one, is nowhere to be found, but a pile of clothing and the lingering scent of jyaki attest to her fate. Something permitted her to hold out longer than I against it, but in the end, its effect is inevitable. Looking back to the hanyou's miko, I see a new sense of strength and calm. The girl's soul, once too large for my sister's mirror, is even greater now.

Her power has grown as well, and the arrow in her hand flares as she draws and takes aim on the enemy's barrier. Her aim is off, however. She thinks to pierce the shield in line with his heart, or where his heart would be, if it beat in his chest. But that point is no longer his weakness.

What is it to me, if they win or lose? I am the wind, and the wind is free. Free of body, free of soul, and the life or death of one hanyou or another cannot change that. I am free of physical needs, but not emotions, not just yet. I would see the one who controlled me dead, and then, perhaps, I will be free of this anger as well.

The miko releases the arrow, and I let out the smallest breath, enough to blow it ever so slightly off its intended course, and onto a new one. The blazing arrow slams home, through barrier, through armor, through what remains of flesh, and exits through the center of the spider-scar on Naraku's back, the mark of Onigumo he could never rid himself of.

It's almost anticlimactic after that. The brothers throw wave after wave of attack between insulting each other, and soon there is nothing left in the ash but Kanna's burned, twisted mirror frame, and the nearly whole Shikon no Tama, glowing with a dark beauty. It flares at the miko's touch, pink and unblemished. Had she been holding the remaining shards in her own hand? I do not know, nor does it matter now. The Jewel was never really my concern.

What remains of my former master is, and I sweep across the devastated field, scattering ash and earth as far as I am able. Never will his filth be permitted to coalesce and return that monster from his grave. I will disperse him over the face of the earth first.

_He's_ leaving, as he always does, without a word or backward look. I have no words now to stop him, but I send a thread of current to him, through the silver mane to tickle the fine hairs on the back of his neck, and for the briefest of seconds, he pauses. Finally, I have won a round.

I whisper on the wind to him, and his head tilts fractionally. Dare I call it a nod? I do.

I'll be watching you, Sesshoumaru.


End file.
